5.  Ms Borovská and Mr Forrai (“the first and third applicants”) were born in 1948 and 1927 respectively, and live in Košice.
6.  Ms Buzová (“the second applicant”) was born in 1937 and also lived in Košice.
On 17 April 2014 the Court received a letter from the applicants’ lawyer informing it that, on 27 October 2013, the second applicant had died and that the inheritance proceedings were pending.
7.  This application and three others (nos. 18803/10, 42812/10 and 44019/11) concern the regularisation of the relationship between ownership and use of real property located in the cadastral area of Košice-Sever.
8.  Certain land in that area was expropriated in the 1980s by the (then socialist) State and a public sports centre was built on it. The sports centre comprises buildings and various other facilities, such as a tennis court, a grandstand, a water station and paved areas.
9.  After the post-1989 political, constitutional and legal changes, litigation took place with a view to resolving various property claims made by the original owners (or their legal successors) against the entities that owned or operated the sports centre or various parts of it.
10.  The land concerned is divided into a number of plots with various owners, many of whom are linked by family relations and history, and who had the same legal representation in the above-mentioned proceedings. Their lawsuits followed a similar pattern, but sometimes had varying results. They included the following proceedings.
11.  The applicants in the present case are successors in title to a plot of land in the above-mentioned area, having inherited their title from the original owner, who died in 1959.
12.  On 22 August 1994 the applicants lodged an action against the owner of a sports centre seeking to obtain a court order for the removal of the constructions on the land.
The principal line of argument was that the expropriation decision of 24 February 1984 was invalid in law. The applicants were therefore the lawful owners of the land in question, in particular plot no. 10610 (recorded on sheet no. 1460 in the “old” records), and the defendant had no lawful title to have the constructions on the applicants’ land.
13.  The action was subsequently amended to state that, alternatively, the applicants sought a judicial ruling establishing an easement on their land for the benefit of the owner of the sports centre in return for financial compensation payable to the applicants. It was also extended to two more defendants: the municipality concerned and a private company.
14.  The action was examined and determined at first instance by the Košice I District Court (Okresný súd). In its judgment (rozsudok) of 11 August 2008, the District Court acknowledged that (i) the expropriation of 1984 was legally ineffective on account of procedural flaws; (ii) as a consequence the applicants were the owners of the land in question; (iii) the constructions on it had been built without a valid legal title in so far as the land was concerned; and (iv) the applicants were entitled to seek redress under general civil law, that is to say Article 135c of the Civil Code (Law no. 40/1964 Coll., as amended), which was not subject to any statute of limitation, unlike the special legislation on restitution, which contained specific time-limits (see paragraph 24 below).
15.  The District Court further held that, for practical reasons, it was out of the question to regularise the situation by establishing that the applicants were the owners of the constructions and ordering them to pay the current owners financial compensation. Furthermore, in the circumstances, it was likewise not practical to order the physical removal of the constructions in question.
16.  However, contrary to the applicants’ assertions, the District Court found that no easement could be established on the land.
The bone of contention was the legal nature of the constructions concerned. Unlike in construction law, in civil law these constructions could not be considered as “buildings” (stavba) in legal terms. An easement over land could only be established for the benefit of the owner of a building in the given sense. In that connection, the court relied on Article 135c § 3 of the Civil Code (Law no. 40/1964 Coll., as amended) (see paragraph 21 below).
The court also noted that it was bound by the legal classification of the applicants’ claim and concluded that, since the constructions on their specific plots of land were not buildings, the claim had to be dismissed.
17.  The applicants challenged the first-instance judgment by means of an appeal (odvolanie) to the Košice Regional Court (Krajský súd).
They argued in particular that the District Court had failed to appreciate that the property in question was part of a large complex serving a single purpose, that a number of claims had been raised in respect of that property, that those claims had been fully or partly successful, that the legal nature of the claims was identical to those raised by the applicants; and that the only difference was the technical parameters of the specific plots at stake.
The applicants pointed out specifically that, in its judgment in case no. 15C 251/94, the District Court had established an easement in respect of plots of land comprising the sports centre on which similar constructions had been built, exactly as claimed by the applicants in the present case. The court had made no distinction between plots with and those without “buildings” on them (see paragraphs 25 et seq. below).
18.  On 11 February 2010 the Regional Court, sitting in chambers, dismissed the applicants’ appeal and upheld the first‑instance judgment, albeit on different grounds. It concurred with the District Court that the expropriation of 1984 was legally ineffective. As a consequence, the State was to be considered as having appropriated the land in question without legal title within the meaning of section 6(1)(p) of the Act on adjustment of ownership rights in respect of land and other agricultural property (Law no. 229/1991 Coll., as amended – “the Land Ownership Act”). The restitution of land in such circumstances fell under the regime of the said legislation and any claims for it had had to be lodged by 31 December 1992 at the latest (see paragraphs 22 et seq. below).
The Regional Court observed that the applicants had failed to pursue that course of action and held that asserting their property rights under general civil law, as the applicants had done, was not permissible.
The applicants’ argument concerning the differing judicial practice went unanswered.
The Regional Court’s judgment became final and binding on 16 March 2010.
19.  On 5 May 2010 the applicants lodged a complaint with the Constitutional Court (Ústavný súd) under Article 127 § 1 of the Constitution (Constitutional Law no. 460/1992 Coll., as amended).
They considered the dismissal of their action arbitrary and alleged that their rights under, inter alia, Article 6 § 1 of the Convention (access, fairness, adequate reasoning) and the constitutional equivalent of Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 had been violated.
Among other things, they argued that – on the specific facts – their case fell outside the purview of the restitution laws cited in the Regional Court’s judgment and that the existence of the restitution laws as leges speciales did not exclude the application of the rules on protection of property rights under the Civil Code as a lex generalis.
In addition, the applicants submitted that judicial practice had varied. They referred to the District Court’s judgment in case no. 15C 251/94 and its judgments in a number of other cases concerning the same sports centre, in which the application of general civil law in an identical context had been accepted. Although they had raised this specific argument before the Regional Court, the latter had taken no position on it and its reasoning had been generally inadequate and arbitrary.
Moreover, the applicants emphasised that it had been sixteen years since the introduction of their action, a protracted period for which they bore no responsibility. They considered that, therefore, any case-law that may have meanwhile been established should not be detrimental to them.
20.  On 3 June 2010 the Constitutional Court declared the complaint inadmissible as being manifestly ill-founded. It observed that it was not a court of further appeal against decisions of the ordinary courts. It cited extensively from the Regional Court’s judgment, finding no constitutionally relevant unfairness, arbitrariness or irregularity in it.
The applicants’ argument concerning the differing judicial practice went unanswered.
The decision was served on the applicants’ lawyer on 30 July 2010.